Chapter 10: Before the Blood

For a moment, Lyra forgot the crypt was collapsing.

Forgot the dead kings kneeling in rings around them.

Forgot Lucien.

Forgot the Hollow Queen screaming somewhere beneath broken stone.

There was only Cassian.

Blood on his mouth.

His breath against hers.

And the sentence still hanging between them like a blade.

“I knew you before they killed your family.”

Lyra shoved herself backward.

Hard enough that her shoulder struck stone.

Cassian let her go instantly.

Too instantly.

Like he’d expected it.

Good.

Because if he’d tried to hold her right now, she might’ve cut him.

“What did you say?”

His chest rose sharply. Blood still soaked the torn fabric over his ribs.

“You heard me.”

“Say it again.”

Lucien remained near the stairwell, sword lowered but ready, watching both of them with narrowed eyes.

Cassian wiped blood from his mouth.

“I knew you.”

Rage hit Lyra so fast it made her dizzy.

“How?”

No answer.

“How?”

“I met you at the summer palace.”

Pieces shifted suddenly in Lyra’s memory.

Fragments she’d buried under grief.

A palace orchard.

Green pears hanging low on bent branches.

A silver-haired prince laughing because she’d bitten him.

Lucien.

And—

Another boy standing apart beneath the trees.

Older.

Black hair.

Watching from the shade with his hands behind his back like he didn’t know what to do with them.

Quiet.

Unreadable.

Eyes darker than the storm overhead.

Her pulse stumbled.

No.

Cassian saw recognition land.

Too late.

“You.”

His expression didn’t change.

But she saw it.

Regret.

The kind that had been sitting in his bones for years.

“You’re the boy by the fountain.”

“Yes.”

Lyra stood slowly.

Her hands shook.

“You watched my family die.”

Cassian’s face hardened.

“I wasn’t there.”

“You knew.”

“Yes.”

The honesty landed harder than any lie.

Stone cracked overhead.

Dust spilled through the crypt.

Nobody moved.

Lyra laughed once.

Sharp.

Ugly.

“You knew.”

Cassian held her gaze.

“I was sixteen.”

“I don’t care.”

“You should.”

“I don’t.”

The dead kings remained kneeling.

Waiting for her next breath.

Lucien stepped carefully around broken marble. “Lyra—”

“Stay out of this.”

He did.

Cassian didn’t move.

Lyra wanted him to.

Wanted him to reach for a weapon so she’d have an excuse.

Wanted him to become cruel again.

Cold.

Untouchable.

Anything but this.

“What happened?” she asked.

Cassian’s jaw tightened.

“The crown accused your father of trying to break the seal beneath the palace.”

“My father guarded the seal.”

“I know.”

“Then why didn’t you stop it?”

That one hit.

For a heartbeat, the prince’s mask slipped.

Exhaustion.

Shame.

Something older.

“I tried.”

Lyra stared.

Cassian’s voice roughened.

“My father ordered the arrests. My mother demanded executions before dawn.” He looked past her toward the broken pit. “By the time I learned what they planned…”

“You did nothing.”

“I got there too late.”

Lyra’s chest hurt.

The Hollow Queen’s heartbeat inside her ribs answered with violence.

Beat.

Beat.

Beat.

Cassian continued anyway.

“I got your younger brother out.”

Lyra froze.

No.

No.

Her brother had died.

She’d seen—

Hadn’t she?

She saw blood.

Smoke.

Soldiers dragging bodies across stone.

But she’d never seen his face.

Her throat tightened.

“You’re lying.”

“I hid him.”

Lyra couldn’t breathe.

“Where?”

Cassian stayed silent.

“Where?”

“I don’t know anymore.”

The silence after that felt endless.

Then Lucien spoke quietly.

“He’s telling the truth.”

Lyra turned sharply.

Lucien looked grim.

“I helped him.”

Cassian’s eyes cut toward his brother.

Too late.

Lucien ignored him.

“The boy was five. Feverish. Barely breathing from smoke inhalation.” He swallowed once. “Cassian got him over the north wall while the executions were happening in the square.”

Lyra’s knees nearly gave out.

“No.”

“Yes.”

“You expect me to believe this now?”

“No,” Cassian said.

The answer was immediate.

Honest.

“No. But it’s true.”

The crypt shuddered violently.

The kneeling dead kings lifted their heads.

Too fast.

Lyra felt it before anyone spoke.

The Hollow Queen was rising again.

Angrier now.

The broken pit pulsed black.

The dead kings’ crowns began to rattle against their skulls.

Lucien swore.

“She’s coming back.”

Cassian bent and picked up his sword.

His body still looked pale beneath the blood loss.

Too pale.

He should barely be standing.

And yet—

He stepped in front of Lyra anyway.

Instinct.

Always.

Lyra hated how much she noticed.

A hand burst from the pit.

Then another.

Black claws dragging across stone.

The Hollow Queen climbed upward from darkness with hair hanging over her face like wet silk.

Her voice came low.

Triumphant.

“You remember.”

Lyra didn’t answer.

The queen’s silver gaze shifted to Cassian.

“You kept the child alive.”

Cassian’s grip tightened.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

He answered without hesitation.

“Because she begged me to.”

Lyra stopped breathing.

The memory hit like a blade.

Smoke.

Soldiers.

Her wrists tied with rope cutting skin.

A boy in black royal clothing standing before her in torchlight.

Terrified.

Young.

And Lyra—sobbing through blood and ash—

Take him. Please. Take my brother.

The boy nodding once.

Wordless.

Then disappearing into fire with a small body in his arms.

The memory shattered.

Lyra swayed.

Cassian glanced back at her.

Only once.

Enough.

The Hollow Queen smiled.

“How cruel,” she whispered. “You saved what mattered most to her… and still became the man she would one day hate.”

Then she lunged.